A typical electronic commerce (eCommerce) web site allows a consumer, logging onto the web site from a client data terminal, such as a personal computer (PC) or a workstation, to purchase goods or services offered by the company maintaining the web site. Such a web site typically requires that the consumer login with the web server that is actually hosting the site. The “login” process usually means that the consumer provide registration information, such as a name, address, telephone number, and electronic mail (email) address, before the consumer is able to access the services offered by the web site. The consumer's registration information is stored in a database maintained by the host server, and in response to receiving the information the host server typically provides the consumer with a unique personal identifier, such as a personal identification number (PIN), that is associated with the stored information. When the consumer subsequently revisits the web site, the PIN can serve to authenticate the user instead of requiring the user to fully re-register.
It is not uncommon for an eCommerce web site to include one or more computer input marks, such as an icon or a textual phrase, that allows a consumer visiting the web site to connect to a second, perhaps unrelated web site hosted by a second web server. Typically, when the second web site is another eCommerce web site, the consumer is again required to login at the second web site, again providing registration information and receiving, in return, a second personal identifier. When, at a future time, the consumer again returns to the second web site via the first web site, the consumer is again required to login to the second web site, providing at least the second personal identifier if not additional registration information. Requiring the consumer to repeatedly provide extensive information every time a consumer links to an eCommerce web site via another eCommerce web site is cumbersome and inconvenient to the consumer.
In order to avoid such repetitive logins, some web servers store on a client data terminal (the consumer's PC) small data files, (also referred to as “objects”) known as “cookies.” When a user of a client data terminal first links to a web site, the host server obtains registration information from the consumer and stores the registration information and/or an assigned personal identifier in a cookie that is stored on the client data terminal. When the user of the client data terminal subsequently links to the web site, the host server locates the cookie on the client data terminal and retrieves the registration information and/or personal identifier from the cookie, eliminating the need for the user to again provide the information or identifier. The use of cookies by host servers has become so widespread that issues of consumer privacy and the storage of cookies on consumers' computers are topics of heated public debate. Some consumers even attempt to block the storage of cookies on their computers or disable cookies already stored there. Furthermore, cookies do not address the needs of the mobile user who often has access to computers spread over distances.
Therefore, a need exists for a method and apparatus whereby a consumer can link to a second web site through a first web site and access the services of the second web site without being required to provide registration information or a personal identifier and without the use of a “cookie.”